Sunday, February 11, 2007

A different kind of roadkill. Northern Peru

Riding through Chiclayo, I somehow managed to get us a bit lost in rice paddy fields. You see, I no longer have great GPS maps for this area and they tend to miss out rather a lot of detail. The road should have gone straight through the town to Piura but instead, we found ourselves riding between waterlogged paddy fields for what seemed like miles. Of course I knew where we were, it´s just that the road I was aiming for happened to be on the other side of the rice fields. We certainly got a few interesting looks from the rice workers as we wobbled along the narrow ridges. Somehow, we did eventually find the correct road and rode on to Piura for the night before getting to the Ecuador border.

After a really bad breakfast (cold distilled coffee like treacle and stale crispbreads anyone?) we were on our way north again to the border. After about an hour, just before Sullana, there was a bit of traffic stopped on the road. When the bus in front of me pulled out to pass the obstacle, I saw a crowd of people and a couple of policemen standing next to a truck on the side of the road. In front of them was someone´s dead body under a some rags though their bare feet were stickng out from the bottom. Just beside the body was a few bits of pink stuff which was quite clearly that persons brains. I´m getting used to seeing various different types of roadkill from dogs, cattle, donkeys and even horses which are left to rot on the roads but this one certainly shocked me.